Corn Population In Your Area

1370rod

Well-known Member
Talking to Darrell a week ago the topic of corn population came up. I mentioned I plant at 32,000 but most corn in this county is planted at 33-36,000. He was surprised at that number and I was surprised to hear their area in NE planted corn at 25,000. We both can grow 200 bu. I measured 10 ft and found my spacing to be 7.25 in 30 in rows, does anyone know how that figures to my actual population. Rod.
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I plant 26,600 to 33,000 depending on the ground. I know of some planting as high as 44,000 this year in twin rows.
 
Yep, 29000 in my book too. That's what I was aiming for but got 32000. Corn doesn't look that nice here.....got froze as it was peeking out. The corn that was completely up looks brown down the row. A good inch of rain would sure help. Funny how we are never happy. Beans are coming up also.
 
I plant 30,000 on 30"rows dry land, an agronomist I buy some product from says a person should back off to 28,000 to allow a little more sunlight in and gain test weight. In the 90's we were planting 22,000 on wide rows while some were still at 18,000.
 
Rod, not a seed in the ground yet, in Northern Ohio by Lake Erie. But we plant at 32000 and hope to get about 29000 plant population. Jerry
 
30 inch dryland here also.

30,000 - 31,500 on a flat rate field depending on the soil.
20,000 - 34,000 on a variable rate field.
 
Here in my corner of SEKS it's about 22000 on upland.
Pretty shallow dirt and a clay subsoil with a lot of aluminum. I did plant some non-gmo at 26000 this year on the advice of my crop/seed guy. We only plant grain sorghum in the 50000 range.
It is a perfect year here if we grow 150 bushel corn unless its bottom or under a pivot. That shallow clay based dirt is why we figure 20 or 25 ponies per plow bottom. Tom
 
Rod,

We were @ 29,000 but have gone back to 26,500 with hybrids that exhibit flex ear size as this is a sandy, shallow soil area that suffers periodic droughts. No need to make the seed companies any richer. Don PS You should be @ 28,900 with 7.25" spacing.
 
When you're combining the vari-rate fields do you notice much difference in production as you roll thru the different populations? Been tempted to back off and see if the ears are bigger with larger kernals, maybe raising test weight.
 
If you have 30 inch rows, measure off 17.5 feet of one row....that equals one thousandths of an acre. Count the number of plants in that length and multiply by 1000 to get plants per acre. Average this over several areas for a more accurate picture. The final stand is usually 5 to 10 percent less than what is actually planted. This year I bumped my population to 34000 ppa up from 32000 last year.Best corn in my test plot ran over 250 bushels per acre, now I have to beat that level....somehow! Ben
 
7.25" X 30" spacing > 1 seedling fills 7.25" X 30" = 217.5 in2 per seedling
convert area in2 to ft2 > 217.5 in2 / 144 in2/ft2 = 1.51 ft2 per seedling
1 acre = 43,560 ft2
43,450 / 1.51 = 28,840 seedlings per acre
 
30,000 seeds per acre here , in 36 inch rows . I have had 4 ton per acre corn,but I have gotten tired of working for nothing . So now I only grow silage corn , same rate. Silage specific corn does best on 36 inch rows.
 
By nature you will see differences (on
the yield monitor, not the eye) as you
roll through the field anyway because
of different soil types.

The biggest differences I've noticed
with variable rate are twofold, One is
higher yields on the best ground
because it also gets more fertilizer to
complement the heavier well drained
soils. The other is higher yields on
poor ground because of correct
fertilizer and seeding rates.

For instance in one field I have a
slough with a side hill around it with
leaching moisture that ends up being an
alkaline salt ring around the bathtub
kind of thing. At 30,000 it will raise
a corn plant (kind of) but won't set
any ears because of the high
population. My variable rate planter
will now automatically drop down to
20,000 as I pass through those areas so
at harvest if all goes well I might get
50 bu/ac instead of a big goose egg.

Same goes for fertilizer in that area.
It used to get the same rate as the
rest of the field, but it was high in
phosphorus and potassium because of
being fertilized for years but never
really raised a crop. Yet nitrogen was
low because nitrogen will move much
more readily through the soil and leach
away. With variable rate I can now
shut off the P and K entirely in those
spots but put on extra N as needed.

Some of our fields have a lot of
variation in them and that's where I
hope the technology pays. The fields
that are much more uniform I'm not sure
it's worth the money unless you're
under irrigation or a high dollar
specialty cash crop of some type.

I could add much more but I do get
windy.
 
Target is to drop 32k in 30" rows and ended up with 32.1k for average in Winona County, MN. Planning to do emergence and stand counts next weekend. When corn prices were better, I dropped 34K but had to cut inputs costs the last two springs and mother nature still calls the shots.

My son got to drive the 2590 by himself preparing a field to be seeded to alfalfa. Not sure who was more proud; him in the big horse doing "man's-work" or my wife and me watching while finishing the beans....
 
Dryland country in western ND, 20,000 for both silage and grain corn here. Last year grain corn was upped to 22k and returned over 100 bu/ac but last year was an exceptional year with record setting crops that most have never seen in their lives. Corn in this area is more of a tool than a big money maker. We feed the grain and silage and sell the excess to the ethanol plant. It helps greatly with weed control in our rotation along with wheat and sunflowers. Used to raise barley for malt and feed but nearly impossible to get it sold without a contract and no new contracts. Silage will yield us 10-12 ton on an average year. I don't think anyone around here has been brave enough to try anything over 25k.
 
Before there were variable rate seeding you would see irrigated fields with the high seed population on the corners that didnt get the extra water, it didnt produce much, now with that solved you get some corn off the corners,that too was solved with farm enginering,started in Nebraska i think.
 
I echo what Straw boss said. We vary from 18,000 plants to 42,000 in NW MN. Plant 73 day to 89 day corn depending on year. We used to get little or nothing on the sand ridges and now at 18,000 seeds we can get up to 120 bu. Has made a huge difference in the yield of the field.

Bryan
 

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